NEW YORK — Access Industries' $3.3 billion winning bid to buy Warner Music Group adds another media company to Len Blavatnik's empire and sets the stage for a possible bid for rival EMI Group.

Blavatnik's all-cash deal for Warner values the world's third-largest music company at $8.25 a share plus debt.

Blavatnik is likely to keep Warner Music's management in place and turn to the team to lead a run for EMI.

EMI is owned by Citigroup, which took control of the company after its former private equity owner Terra Firma defaulted on loans.

Blavatnik agreed to pay a 63 percent premium to Warner's share price on Jan. 20 when news broke that the music company's board had assigned advisers to explore its strategic options — including a sale.

Blavatnik, 53, has been a U.S. citizen since 1984. He ranks No. 80 on the Forbes world billionaires list released in March, with a net worth of $10 billion.

Taking Warner Music away from the demands of being publicly traded is seen as an opportunity for Warner Music executives to take a bigger gamble on refocusing the company's traditional business model in the face of shrinking sales, rampant piracy and an uncertain digital future.

A couple in interesting points:
The widely reported story that the founder of Napstar would buy WB (and thus owning the Metallica's record company contract) is now a dead story.

With WB no longer tied to stock holders, there is a small chance the company could go back to actually signing artists for long term musical ability, and not just a quick buck to appease the stock price. But that is just speculation.

If this same Billionaire does go after EMI, that would be there would only be 3 majors record companies left in the world. Given the EMI was seized by creditors and is currently being run by a credit card company, it would not be surprising if such a sale were to occur.

Such a merger would be bad for the employees, as massive layoffs would result from a merger. However, with lower costs and private ownership, this has the potential to be a new era in what it means to be a major record label, and could have drastic changes to way major labels are run.

This has the potential to be the best thing that has happened to the music industry in some time, or could also end up being the worst thing, given all the power will be held by one person.

There are only three major record companies now. Sony/BMG, Warner and EMI.

I don't hold out that any of the business model will change. They'll probably continue to blame online piracy on the fact that they're losing money rather than on the fact that they were too slow to react to a changing market. They won't bring in any new physical formats - and that's when you consider that the CD is nearly 30 years old and is laughable with what could be physically produced now. Combine that with a total lack of understanding of how to make a sustainable business model (innovate, create and capitalise) means that the labels have been dying a slow death for the last decade.

I just don't see the model changing. Stagnation has been the model of all the majors for years now. Something popular emerges, they formularise it and then beat it to death with the 'boring' stick. To be honest, I really couldn't care what happens to the vast majority of the major labels - they'll probably find the only way to survive is to down-size their assets and create a more flexible internal model by releasing some of the smaller companies that they own and letting them operate autonomously - that way, the inherent conservatism of the industry (which had led to their demise) might be overcome.

Investors make stupid decisions all the time. You just have to look at the Glazer Brothers and what they've managed to do at Manchester United. Saddling an otherwise profitable club with a huge fan base into a club with half a billion Pounds of debt that can't make money even when they top the English Premier League.

I always forget about Universal!
Investors make stupid decisions all the time. You just have to look at the Glazer Brothers and what they've managed to do at Manchester United. Saddling an otherwise profitable club with a huge fan base into a club with half a billion Pounds of debt that can't make money even when they top the English Premier League.

Hah , MFB we have more in common than you think ! We're stuck with the Glazers on our side of the pond. Now that the Tampa Bay Bucs have been loosing fan base , the Glazers this pass season resorted to black outs of the games , boy did that backfire......

Could never understand their decision to buy your soccer team ( well yeah I can , its about money) , they have a hard enough time running a NFL football team. They had no business buying a soccer team.

I just don't see the model changing. Stagnation has been the model of all the majors for years now. Something popular emerges, they formularise it and then beat it to death with the 'boring' stick. To be honest, I really couldn't care what happens to the vast majority of the major labels - they'll probably find the only way to survive is to down-size their assets and create a more flexible internal model by releasing some of the smaller companies that they own and letting them operate autonomously - that way, the inherent conservatism of the industry (which had led to their demise) might be overcome.

Do bands still get spotted by travelling A&R men from record companies that will offer them a recording contract? Or is that just something that only took place decades ago.
I honestly don't know how it's done these days.